Monday, 23 September 2013

The Centre Left goes to…Brighton!

An occasional Centre Left series which
tends to happen whenever I get the chance to go anywhere. I don’t get out much,
y’see.

It’s been a
while, Brighton. As my grandparents' home for the first twenty years or so of my life, it’s a bit like coming back to see
an old friend, who you don’t see very often but it’s always a pleasure.

If I
remember well, my last conference here was 2000, my clearest memory being of myself
and various other reprobate comrades at about 3am singing "Roll Out The Barrel" (or similar) in an upstairs lobby of
one of the larger hotels, which happened to have a grand piano.

These days I’ll
have to make do with the traditional conference karaoke with some old friends (yes,
@martinangus, we all know that LAWS is the best karaoke in town and will be on at the New Madeira Hotel on Monday night).

For those
who don’t frequent the town much, since my childhood it has developed a markedly hippy,
liberal vibe which it's hard not to warm to, as well as transforming itself into surely the
unchallenged gay and lesbian capital of the UK. It’s also home to some very
sensible and decent Labour people I have met over the years.

Since my last conference here, a fairly solid Labour council here has fallen to the Greens. Despite my
politics being of a modestly greenish hue, one wonders about their ability to
manage their way out of a paper bag, let alone a multi-milllion pound council budget. I guess we will see how they’ve done at the
urns in 3years’ time. My guess is they won’t
stay, and they were there for the same reason as George Galloway in Bradford,
because of a general disillusionment with politics. But I could be wrong.

And so to
the political content of this conference. Most conferences are labelled “make or
break” for some spurious reason or another, and this one is no exception. Although
Labour really needs to start breaking its silence on major policy areas, whatever
Miliband says about policy will still probably not be listened to by the public
– yet.

But it genuinely
is make-or-break in one particular
area: Miliband’s proposals on party
reform need to be accepted, in principle if not outright (that will be at a
special conference next Spring).

If they are
not, two things will happen: firstly, he will probably not lose the leadership
but his own credibility will be shot, and his chances of reaching Number Ten
will be seriously diminished, if not destroyed.

Worse, the
party will have lost the chance for serious reform for a generation, and what
someone once called “the forces of conservatism” will have won a very important
victory.

As the Centre Left has blogged on many occasions, you cannot
underestimate the importance of party. Miliband did with the failure of the “damp
squib” Refounding Labour programme, and it came back to bite him. We cannot
afford to fail this time.

As it so happens,
you may have seen from a series of news and comment pieces in the Independent
over recent weeks that myself and my good colleagues from Labour Uncut will be launching tonight our first-ever book, entitled Labour manifesto uncut
– How to Win in 2015, containing some rather good ideas on how to do just
that.

However, it’s
about more than just manifesto policy - my own little chapter is different: it’s
about party reform and how it could actually be the key to a revival in
Miliband’s poll ratings.

The point is
that there are still other things still not
covered by the Collins Review on party reform – a document I read on the journey and seems pleasingly robust – which Labour still needs to do,
like sort out its damaging addiction to identity politics in our ethnic
communities.

In other
words, we only have one chance in this generation before the window closes
again – let’s really sort things out.
There are plenty of other things apart from Falkirk-style stitch-ups which the
party needs to fix.

And for the rest...you'll just have to read the book.

Labour manifesto uncut –
How to Win in 2015 will be launched tonight, Monday 23
September at the Pragmatic Radicalism fringe, details here.

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About the blogger

Activist, free thinker, Labour Party management team through 2001 and 2005 general elections, responsible for Labour's early web presence and creator of its first-ever national electoral register. Dad to two lovely little girls. Now work as project/programme/interim manager for an evil multinational, with a sideline in political commentary.

Politically think of myself as a loyalist (rather than a parrot). Member of Progress and the Co-op. My posts are vetted only by my, er, own sense of discretion and propriety. I've worked in business for many years, so have no truck with anti-business prejudice. Like social/ethical business, co-operatives and sustainability. Fought one general election and longlisted by NEC panel to be Labour candidate in 2010.